4io 
FOREST AND STREAM. 
[Sept. 15. 1906. 
the hang-dog feeling of a virtual accessory, even 
though the crime of moonshining is only malum 
prohibitum, not malum in se. Well, it chanced 
that I was called north about this time. While 
there. I received a letter from a friend in the 
mountains, which is here reproduced verbatim, 
save for the omission of personal names: 
“Dear sir I was Proud to Her from you. I am 
well as common Hope your the same. the 
tempeture is nice her now but the Elements 
looks som like Rain, the soft Maples is Bloomin 
out now. ther is nothing New in the Mountings 
at present, but-got his bier tubs 
cut Down by the Revnew oficers. my Black 
hound has pups. 
“yours Truly, 
There will never be any picture taken of that 
still-house, but the still itself seems to have 
escaped on its wily owner’s back, for only the 
tubs were cut down. What beer-tubs are, in a 
whiskey distillery, will be explained in the next 
chapter. Horace Kephart. 
[to be continued.] 
The Kaffir Telegraph. 
Mention has been frequently made during the 
recent native troubles in South Africa of the 
“Kaffir telegraph,” the strange system by which 
news of any importance is communicated from 
one extreme of the native territories to the other 
with almost incredible rapidity, and the working 
of which, it has been stated, is still a mystery 
to the white man. This latter statement is 
scarcely correct. It is true that the whole 
workings of this secret system are not fully 
known, but numbers of up-country residents, 
traders, and the like are well acquainted with 
many of the ways in which, communication 
passes from tribe to tribe. Any news that is 
spread in this way is news that it is desirable 
to keep from the European, and for this reason 
Kaffirs will never go into full details; but enough 
has leaked out to give a good inkling of many of 
the means adopted. 
The trading store is the meeting place for the 
natives, where they come, not only to purchase 
and sell, but to meet others. Men cross the 
border into another tribe’s country to attend at 
the general gatherings which take place from 
morning to night outside these stores, and a 
good deal of news is carried forward by this 
means. In most cases the news, if important, 
is not made public to the whole tribe until it is 
necessary to do so. A headman has been told 
by his chief to despatch a certain item of infor¬ 
mation onward. This man comes to the store, 
which, for the sake of argument, we will say is 
in Fingoland. Ele looks round at the group out¬ 
side the building, and notes what strangers are 
present, for a Kaffir can tell at a glance to what 
tribes any men he meet belongs, though no white 
man can certainly do this. The bearer of the 
message picks out two or three Gealekas, and 
goes to them and inquires their standing in their 
tribe. If one of those he speaks to is a head¬ 
man the information is passed to him to carry 
to his chief, with a request that the chief will 
pass it on again; if. on the other hand, those 
he addresses are none of them headmen, he 
selects the oldest man. and takes him aside and 
imparts the news to him. “You are the mes¬ 
senger of the chief,” says the headman. “A 
man who carries a chief’s message must keep 
his eyes and ears open and his mouth closed, 
or ill may happen”; and the native accepts the 
hint and acts on it. He leaves at once, and, 
starting off on the peculiar jog-trot which 
Kaffirs always adopt when in a hurry, or on im¬ 
portant business, he soon has impressed himself 
with the vast responsibility, for such it appears 
to him. The same procedure is do.ne with the 
other strangers present, and. by this means be¬ 
fore the night three or four chiefs are acquainted 
with the news. 
This is the usual way in which the news is 
first spread, and for this reason I have selected 
Fingoland as a starting point, as it is the first 
country over the border. When the chiefs re¬ 
ceive the message they will no doubt act in 
different ways to pass it on. One selects a fast 
runner, and gives him the words, and instructs 
this man to run in a given direction as fast as 
he can—horses are never used at this work— 
until he is exhausted. When he can run.no 
longer he enters the nearest kraal, selects the 
chief man, gives him the words, and this man in 
his turn picks out his fastest runner, who at 
once starts off until he also is exhausted, when 
he acts in a similar way. 
It is not an enviable task carrying a chief’s mes¬ 
sage at night, for the native is always suspicious 
of cattle thieves. Assegais and guns are handy, 
and the man who dashes past a kraal in the 
dark may possibly come to a sudden stop with 
an assegai or a bullet through him; but, failing 
this extreme method, he is liable, when near the 
borders, to be seized by the native police as a 
suspicious character, and though his detention 
might be for only a day or so, it is almost as 
bad as the more summary punishment, for the 
native holds his chief in such awe that, should 
he not be able to follow his instructions, it is 
doubtful if he would dare to return to his tribe. 
I have been told that even the Kaffir police, who 
are most loyal, are still so under the spell of 
the chiefs that, should the runner inform them 
of the object of his journey, they would not de¬ 
tain him: but I have my doubts as to whether 
this is so. With relays of runners like this a 
hundred miles can be covered in twenty-four 
hours. 
Returning to our starting point, Fingoland, 
the message would be carried a hundred miles 
in a straight line by the next morning, but as 
the Kaffir country is further penetrated tribes 
(?) spread out from the main line to the sea, 
the Pond-os and Pondo Mesies on the one hand, 
the 6 acas and Xesibes on the other,, and these 
would have been all reached by the other mes¬ 
sengers, and in this way four or five separate 
chiefs would have known the news by them. 
The system of “calling messages” is largely 
used by the natives in war-time. The air in 
South Africa is so dry that sound carries a 
very long way. Native messengers are sta¬ 
tioned at the tops of hills to call messages to 
each other. It is no exaggeration to say that 
they can make themselves heard and carry on 
conversation a quarter of a mile distant; but for 
obvious reasons they cannot be stationed so 
close together, so a system of signalling by 
smoke is carried on at night, but this means is 
not followed in such a case as I am trying to 
describe. 
In an article I wrote for the Field a few years 
ago I mentioned the case of a white man (named 
Groom) who had settled down among the 
Pondos and had adopted their ways, and, ex¬ 
cept for the trifling difference of color, was to 
all intent a Kaffir himself. This man once, in 
answer to an argument which took place out¬ 
side the store in Mount Frese, offered to have 
a message delivered in Komgla (about 200 miles 
away) on the day after the one on which we 
were speaking, and a note was accordingly writ¬ 
ten to a storekeeper in that village and given 
him. On the second morning a Kaffir walked 
into the store in Kamgha.and placed the paper 
in the storekeeper’s hand and walked out; but 
we never found out how this had been accom¬ 
plished. In this connection I may mention an 
amusing incident which occurred. A visitor to 
Kaffirland who had been informed of the way 
in which messages could be transmitted, and the 
saving of time such a system effected, was so 
struck with the idea that he wrote, suggesting 
to the colonial Government that the up-country 
mails should be handed over to the chiefs for 
them to rush through. It is, perhaps, needless 
to say that his suggestion was not adopted.— 
Ormond Lodge in London Field. 
THE CAMPER’S FRIEND. 
Pure Milk is desirable wherever you camp, one or one 
thousand miles from civilization. Borden’s Eagle Brand 
Condensed Milk always opens up perfectly fresh, pure 
and satisfactory. It is the first item thought of by the 
veteran camper .—A civ. 
Piovano Arlotto. 
Piovano (a parson) Arlotto was a village 
clergyman who had a small living and church 
a few_ miles from Florence. He had trayeled as 
a ship’s chaplain to many countries, even to Eng¬ 
land, leaving in every land memories of rare 
jests and droll adventures. He was, however, 
at heart a really good man, proverbial in his day 
as “a priest who was not avaricious, and very 
hospitable.” 
And this virtue of hospitality was sometimes 
to him a source of great annoyance. For. accord¬ 
ing to the custom of the time, every parish priest 
was supposed to keep an open table for all 
comers; and those who did not, suffered severely 
in reputation. No matter how pious a parroco 
might be, if he gave not good wine, people said: 
“He is good, but wants the bes't.” 
Thus it befell that there came to his house 
certain sportsmen, who made themselves even 
more at home than the license of that free-and- 
easy age permitted. Thus runs the chronicle: 
Four catchers of birds, with eight companions, 
four horses, four hawks, and sixteen dogs, went 
forth to hunt, and quartered themselves on 
Piovano Arlotto for five days. 
“Then they departed for Florence, leaving their 
dogs in care of Piovano, saying, ‘We beg you to 
take as good care of these dogs as you would of 
us. We shall remain in Florence a week, and 
then return and be your guests for four days 
more.’ 
1 hen Pio.vano, who, though a very good man, 
could be slyer than a fox, replied, ‘Leave them. 
I will indeed treat them as if they were mine 
own.’ 
“Then he considered unto himself, and said, 
‘With what ingratitude do they behave! Thirty- 
six mouths must I fill for them every day. They 
go to Florence to enjoy themselves—children of 
the devil!—and leave their sixteen dogs for me 
to feed. While here they’ve taken forty par¬ 
tridges, yet have not given me a single bird!’ 
"When his guests were gone, Piovano Arlotto 
proceeded to show bread to the dogs after this 
fashion: twice or three times every day he went, 
bearing a bastone, or stick, in the right hand and 
three or four loaves in the left; entering the 
room in which the hounds were kept, he threw 
down the bread, but when they would devour 
it, he beat them. 
“And when three days were past, the sports¬ 
men returned, and, looking at the dogs, said, 
‘Why are these dogs so lean and miserable?’ 
“Piovano replied, 'I know not why; but they 
refuse to eat bread, and truly it is a wonderful 
thing.’ 
“Then he brought bread and threw it to the 
hounds; but they, fearing lest they should be 
beaten, were afraid to touch it. And when he 
drew near, they howled and fled, and hid them¬ 
selves for fright, and when a door was opened, 
they ran away through it as for their lives, and 
the sportsmen had enough to do to take them, 
nor did they return to that house. 
“ 'I won the game that time,’ said Arlotto, as 
he watched the flight.” 
The Elder’s Prairie Chicken. 
Rev. J. J. Pearce, D.D., of Pennsylvania, is an 
eminent minister of the gospel, a successful poli¬ 
tician (he has been a member of Congress), a 
true sportsman, and a noble .specimen of a man. 
While on a visit to friends in Iowa a few years 
ago he expressed a great desire to have a chicken 
hunt, and to be able to say on his return that 
he had dined on the noble bird of the prairie. A 
hunt was organized and he put himself at its 
head; and after a hard day’s work and many 
miles’ travel, the shooters returned with a half 
dozen birds. These were given to the wife of 
one of the party to be prepared for supper, and 
the Elder was invited. Supper time came; there 
were pies, cakes, preserves, meats of every kind 
and variety, but no prairie chicken. The Elder 
i\as puzzled as well as disappointed. The woman 
being interviewed about it afterward, said that 
she had been better raised than to set the likes 
of a prairie chicken before a nice gentleman 
like Mr. Pearce. 
